Popular Catholic Priest, Monsignor Sylvester Osigwe Is Dead

CYRIACUS IZUEKWE

A popular Catholic Priest and Director of Healing Ministry known as Jesus Is Love in Ifo, Ogun State,Very Reverend Monsignor Sylvester E. U. Osigwe has passed on.

P.M.EXPRESS gathered that Msgr. Osigwe died early morning on Saturday 22nd June, 2019, at the age of about 80 after a protracted illness reportedly associated with age.

He was ordained a Catholic Priest in 1977 and rose to the position of Monsignor before he died.
Monsignor Osigwe was the Parish Priest; St. Mary’s Catholic Church, Alaja-Ifo, Ogun State and was in charge of the Healing Ministry that had liberated many families across the states and outside Nigeria for several years.
The late Osigwe was the Parish Priest of St. Augustine, Ikorodu Parish, where he started the ministry before moving to Ifo in Ogun State, where he continued the adoration ministry before he died. He hailed from Imo State but he was ordained a priest in Lagos before he traveled to Vatican City for further studies.

It was gathered that the cleric had been sick probably due to old age before he eventually died after an undisclosed protracted illness.
Osigwe’s pastoral journey from the beginning was not an easy one; he grew up as a mass server in the Catholic Church to the Legion of Mary.
Having discovered that the secular lifestyle was not meant for him while working in Lagos, he made a U-turn and decided to enroll to study philosophy and theology at SS. Peter and Paul Major Seminary, Ibadan, for priesthood training. After his formational trainings in the seminary, he was ordained as a priest in 1977. His ordination came at a time when priestly vocation was not very common.

In one of his speeches Msgr. Osigwe said, “Although I was not happy then because the ordination was carried out at the Oba’s palace in Abeokuta instead of a cathedral. All the paraphernalia associated with ordination was not adequately observed. That, to me, was a challenge and a test of faith but my ordination was a blessed one”.

From there, he went to St. Mary’s Catholic Church, Ajegunle, Apapa, Lagos, to celebrate his first mass, and he continued in prayer and spirituality which gave birth to the Charismatic Renewal Movement in Lagos at that time. He served in several parishes in Lagos and Ogun states before proceeding to Rome for his Master’s degree in theology. The parishes included St. Leo Catholic Church, Ikeja, St. Agnes, Maryland, SS. Mulumba & David Catholic Church, Ikate, Surulere and Ibowon Parish in Epe Division.
He was overseeing the Eucharistic Heart of Jesus (EHJ) Sisters Juniorate and Epe Military Battalion as Chaplain before he left Ibowon Parish in 1985 to Rome for further studies, where the passion for healthcare services through prayer and sacramental healing process grew.

Many people with various problems came for counseling and healing. He was able to sanitize Ibowon town, known to have had fetish shrines, with fervent prayers before he traveled and continued the healing process in Vatican City, Rome.
Osigwe faced challenges while he was in the Vatican City, but some Vatican officials who discovered his keen interest in prayer, healing and evangelism began to recommend books to him to help perfect the cause. They encouraged and sponsored him to the Special College of Pastoral Theology of Healthcare and Evangelization at Camilianum International Institute, Rome, and later the St. John’s Pontifical University Lateran, Rome, for his double Master’s degrees in theology.
Other people also facilitated his exposure to healing such as Bishop Wagner who was in charge of ‘Co Unum’ Caritas in Rome, the late Bishop Anthony Nwedo of Umuahia Diocese, who gave him a letter of authority to profess to a sick sister in Rome. Many people who had problems of different kinds went to him for prayers.

“Besides, Cardinal Onaiyekan, who resided in Vatican then, was a witness as he once approached me while I went to the Vatican upper chamber on one of my routine assignments. Thereafter, my fervency in prayers and spiritual healing became known. I became a health consultant and God used me mightily among the people in Vatican” he said in an interview.
However, that did not go well without challenges, he was under scrutiny by the authorities in Vatican which had negative insinuations that the practice was wrong.
He said, “But to God be the glory, all these services were for mankind and not for personal gains. A lot of cases came up which I treated within Vatican and that was how many people got to know about me. I was called upon to handle the ill-health of Cardinal Ekandem and that really closed the mouth of everybody”.

The date for the burial Msgr. Osigwe is yet to be announced by the Catholic Church.